Russian lobbyist met with Trump Jr: AP

The second Russian individual who attended a controversial meeting with Donald Trump Jr., Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner has been identified as a lobbyist who has been reported to have ties to Russian intelligence agencies.

The Associated Press reported that Rinat Akhmetshin attended the meeting, stating that Akhmetshin confirmed his presence at the June 9, 2016, meeting in Trump Tower.

The AP states that Akhmetshin dismissed claims that he has ties to Russian intelligence as a "smear campaign."

Akhmetshin told the AP that he served in a military unit that was part of counterintelligence operations but said he was not formally trained as a spy.

In one of the emails that Trump Jr. shared via Twitter earlier this week, Rob Goldstone, a music promoter and acquaintance of Trump Jr.'s who helped arrange the meeting, writes that he plans to "send the names of the two people meeting with you for security when I have them later," including a Russian lawyer.

The lawyer was publicly identified earlier this week as Natalia Veselnitskaya, but the identity of the second person was not established prior to today. Trump Jr. did not refer to a second individual allegedly in attendance at the meeting in any of the multiple statements he has made about it since knowledge of it became public last weekend.

Akhmetshin's role, or the reason why he would be included in the meeting, is not stated in the emails.

He marks the seventh person that was in the room during the meeting: Donald Trump Jr., then-campaign chairman Manafort, then-campaign advisor Kushner, Goldstone, Veselnitskaya, Akhmetshin and a translator, who has not been publicly identified.

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